Retribution
by Evil-Ekat
Summary: Gravity Falls had never been quite what it seemed. Bill had known this, and had used it to his advantage. But when the tables are turned, he finds himself left in the dark. Or rather, an abandoned Gravity Falls. No pairings.


**Sorry, no pairings. I needed the break. Again, stare at a wall and rethink everything, or curl up in to a ball and cry. Tell me what you think, how you interpreted it. My eyes are more glazed than a doughnut from staring at a screen, trying to figure out what the hell I just wrote. **

**Disclaimer: I don't own Gravity Falls.**

* * *

_Blank..._

_So white..._

_Someone was screaming..._

_Was it him?_

_Someone else?_

_No... He felt it was him..._

_Yes he was certain it was him who was screaming._

His vision began to clear. The demon grogily floated to his feet and stretched his papery-thin arms. What had happened? What had be done? Blinking his one, the demon found himself staring down the statue of Nathaniel Northwest. The rusted copper statue refused to blink it's noble looking yet clouded eyes, so he blinked instead.

Rolling his eye at the good for nothing cover up of Quentin Trembly, the demon floated closer to the ground. Despite not really consisting of a head, if one were to consider the space between his eye and hat his head, that particular area felt fuzzy, staticy.

It didn't help that it felt as if gravity was taxing himself more so than usual, and he couldn't really float. The only problem with this was he was too flat to walk properly, so he ended up with his feet dragging across the ground. What had caused his current state? What _was _his current state?

A quick once over of the town clearly told him he wasn't in anyone else's dreamscape, that much was clear to him. And the lack of yellow and various collections of animal teeth told him he wasn't his mind either. So that meant he was in the real Gravity Falls yes?

Curiously, he inspected the name plate at the base of the slowly rotting statue.

_"Nathaniel Northwest, founder of our fair town..."_

All seemed to be in order with the exception of one small thing. A tiny detail that anyone but he would miss. His insignia, the upwards facing triangle he had etched in to the metal all those years ago. It was gone! As if someone had taken a hammer and knocked out the little dent in the plaque. How had this happened without him knowing?

Curious now, he wandered through the streets, looking for other tell-tale signs of the hidden symbol. Crossing streets, looking through windows, looking at store fronts in certain angles. There was nothing. Gone! All of his tiny markings were gone, with out him ever discovering to boot! A wave of apprehension washed over the demon.

_"Gone? How could they be missing?! I ensured it myself that no one but me could ever get rid of them! It can't be possible!"_

Another realization dawned on him. Was he invisible? Had anyone seen him?! The last thing he wanted to deal with was any terrified citizens at the moment. Peering at his reflection in a window, he was relieved to see, or rather not see himself staring back. Suddenly, a flash or orange-red and black caught his attention. He whirled around to face what it was, but nothing was there.

The demon rubbed his eye, wondering what it could possibly be. He had always possessed vision about that of an ordinary man. Unlike human kind, his spectras were not limited to any one wavelength. As the all seeing eye, he saw all. Every last disgustingly detailed thing; From the forces that sought him out, to the lowest down fraction of energy forming an atom.

Case and point, he was not one to imagine things, hallucinate. Therefore, this whatever it was had certainly been seen by him.

Well, it seemed as if no other tasks were pressing on his frontal agendas, and he would admit to himself he was curious about what was going on.

He toiled down the way he was certain it had gone, yet found nothing. Where could have it hidden? To him it appeared as if all of the stores and other buildings were locked up. Just as he was going to search down a different street, the black and scarlet caught his attention again.

The demon sharply turned to face the glint of colours, pin pointing them in the general vicinity of the greasy spoon diner across the road.

In an inhuman blink, he was floating outside of the old building, peering through the dusty and smudged windows. There was no one inside the restaurant, it looked almost abandoned. Chairs were half pulled out from the tables, napkins and splatters of condiments scattered across the counter top, while chipped and unwashed porcelain dished sat on the counter, in the sink, and on a few of the tables.

He gave a sigh of disgust and frustration at his inability to find what he was looking for. Where had everyone gone? Gravity Falls was a complete ghost town!

_"Did I do this?" _He wondered, surveying the town from where he hovered, his feet barely touching the ground.

He gave one last glance at the deserted place so may of the citizens frequented. But he saw the red again. Dertmined this time to see for himself what it was, the triangle fiercely glared at the window pane. Startled, he recoiled as two people now sat in one of the booths.

The red headed teen that worked for Stan talked silently with another person who he was unfamiliar with. He looked be her age, and was rather luridly dressed. As the red head continued to speak, it looked more and more as if the boy as trying and failing not to smirk. The more he failed at hiding his triumph, the more more upset the red head became. Finally, it came to the point where someone would not distinguish between her freckles and the rest of her face.

The triangle's bow tie twisted in to what could be considered a smirk. He observed as the darkly dressed teen was slapped, and had his partner's drink poured all over him. He couldn't hear what she was yelling at him, but he did have a basic grasp at reading lips.

_"I can't believe you Robbie! How could you be so jealous of him?! He's just a kid! Was it really that bad between you two?! You're happy to see Dipper like this, you're happy to see him and Mabel-"_

Much to the demon's annoyance, she ran out of the diner, frustrated tears streaking down her face. He did not hear or see where she went, and as he tried to look in the restaurant again, everyone had vanished yet again.

What was the rest of what she was going to say? Dipper and Mabel... What _had_ happened to Stan's little brats? He knew the teen worked for him, and she was close to the twins. So she was upset over something that had happened to them... Had _he _happened to them? Dare he hope he had finally incapacitated the pesky kids?

Little flashes of things swam in to his conscience.

_Sparks of blue light..._

_The twin's scream of mixed terror an surprise..._

_He had..._

_They were backed in to a corner, no where left to run..._

Yet another flash of colour caught his attention. This one a lavender hue.

The demon was luckier this time, he found who he was looking for in an antique shop full or mirrors. It was that blond girl who's parents practically owned the town. She was the one who treated the world like it was her doormat. Not a bad attitude really. But he couldn't help but gag as she continued to admire her multiple reflections.

_"Moving on..."_

Before he could leave, he enjoyed watching as Old Man McGucket crashed into the girl. She screamed and ran off at the appearance of the deranged man. Somehow, she vanished as soon as she left the shop. He never even sw her open the front door...

Odd. This was very peculiar, even by Gravity Falls' standards. The town seemed almost abandoned with only a few remainders. Could it be a result of his fighting with the Pines that almost no one was left around?

Despite himself, the demon could not help but shiver. As he farther explored the town, he only became more aware of how wrong the whole situation felt.

Bill Cipher had lived many a year, yet never in his memory had he ever seen Gravity Falls, let alone any where like it's current state.

He wandered throughout the streets, his feet still brushing the ground slightly as he tried to stay afloat. The demon decided the town did not feel like it was abandoned, but rather like time had frozen around him. It hadn't of course, those grey nut-cases from the future were always on his case if he so much as went a second back in time. If time really had frozen, he would probably have a whole militia chasing after him by now.

And come to think of it, how long had he been awake for? The demon found his once sharp concept of time gone, leaving him absolutely clueless.

It was daylight, but everything had been locked up as if it were after hours. Inside all of the town's little stores and businesses things were still set up like people were just going through a normal day of work. Lights were on, materials were out, yet no one was there to work.

Strangely enough, no clocks were present in any of the buildings either. Stranger yet, when he tried to pull out his pocket watch from thin air, nothing happened. His hand remained empty. The triangle's eye widened. His powers! What was happening to him?! He tried to concentrate on summoning his watch, a spare bow tie, anything really. His thoughts instantly drew to one conclusion.

_"The Pines."_

Of course none of them would go down with out a fight, it was apparently left out of their genetic code. He should know, he had never backed down from a fight either. He had too much pride to do so, as did Stan. They were all to similar. Mirror images when it came to so many things. How irony never ceased to amaze him millennium after millennium...

His great-niece was not so much motivated by pride as she was uncontrollable energy and spirit. His great-nephew... A mix of his sister's spirit, Stan's pride, and a moral compass that was truly one of a kind. He suspected if he had to wager on who would have second thoughts about backing down, it would be Dipper.

He had fought against all of this, and he had won. It must have drained his powers slightly, nothing a bit of rest couldn't fix. It wasn't like he had anything else to do after defeating them. Yes, that he was very sure of that. It would have been a near impossible feat, but he had utterly destroyed them. He hoped. No, he knew he had destroyed them. He had won, they had lost. He was Bill Cipher, he couldn't possibly loose!

"You hear that Pines family?! You lost! After all these years of declaring I'd never win Stanford, you lost! And your precious great-niece and nephew paid the price as well!"

His voice carried through the empty boulevards, reverberating off the buildings.

Suddenly, the demon found himself collapsing on his nonexistent knees. Dirt was clearly visible against his papery thin appendages as he was no longer able to suspend what little he weighed in the air.

"I...won..."

_"But now what?"_

The Mystery Shack, the Journals. He should go find those next correct? But when he attempted to get up, his body did not receive the memo.

_"Come on Bill. Get up, float!"_

He couldn't. Just another item on the grocery list of things he now could not do. He would have to break both of his boneless legs before he walked anywhere, someone would have to kill him first. What few scraps of dignity he could maintain by being ridiculously short were covered up by his hat, and the fact he towered above everyone by floating most of the time.

Additionally, he did not walk so much as he... waddled. If there was one thing he hated about being so flat, that was it. Just imagining how seriously people would take him if he just strolled down the sidewalk made him cringe.

_"Get up! Move! You can't stop now, you have the whole of Gravity Falls at your mercy if you just. Get. Up!"_

The triangle remained there on the ground, stuck in place. Because there was no one around, he allowed himself to give an audible sigh of frustration and flat out exhaustion. Maybe he should just give up.

"What?! Give up?! I'm Bill Cipher, master of the mind and defeater of the Pines family! I don't give up! To the Mystery Shack!"

Somehow he managed to vanish from his spot. But it was not like the thousands of other times he had teleported from one place or another.

_Things swirled around him, blending in to one incoherent blob. He began to feel dizzy as it all span around him. It was then things started to leap out at him._

_He saw Gideon, pacing in his jail cell..._

_Wendy, lazing around in the Shack's gift shop..._

_Robbie, practicing his lip synching..._

_Pacifica, painting her nails a flashy red.._

_Soos, walking to the Mystery Shack..._

_Old Man McGucket, his death ray had backfired again..._

_A tombstone, deep within the woods. A once familiar name carved in the granite..._

_Then he saw himself. He was everywhere, the windows, the deck of cards, in the arcade. There was no escape from the all seeing eye. He was watching, always watching..._

_Ten symbols..._

_Just remember, I'll be watching you!_

_You..._

_You..._

_You..._

_Dipper, Mabel, Stan. They were all standing in the gift shop. They were blurry at first, he could not see what they were doing, if anything at that..._

To the demon, it appeared like he was observing them from a window, or a wall inside the gift shop. None of them had spotted him, or noticed his horrifying shock.

They were not dead! They should be six feet under in their cold, hard graves. Yet there they were alive and well. So he had not won? Had they fought at all?

The triangle pushed away a simmering disgust as he watched Stan quickly hug both twins before leaving the room. He had been so sure he had emerged victorious, but after all this time it had amounted to nothing. So what had happened to him then?

At that moment, something caught his eye. The twins, both looking grim held something. In Mabel's hands, a peculiarly flat hat, while Dipper held a matching bow tie.

Instantly, the demon's hand flew to his head where his hat no longer resided. If he could see his tie, he would have guessed it was missing as well.

"Do you think he's gone for good this time?" Mabel quietly asked her brother.

"Certain. We got rid of all those symbols didn't we? He's as dead as a door nail."

_"Dead? Who's dea-"_

The idea formed in his mind, gradually spreading to all of the occurences of the past while. Connected, everything was. The never ending wheel, the all seeing eye...

"No..." The demon hoarsely whispered. "It couldn't be..."

But the only people he could see were the ones who matched exactly with the symbols. It was why Gravity Falls had appeared so bare...

"No..."

The diner window, the antique store full off mirrors. He could only see them through the reflections. The other side, the one the metaphorical chicken had crossed over from...

"No!"

And now, the twins held the two things that would truly ever belong to him. The two things he would never relinquish, he would rather die than let go of...

"NO! NO! NO! It's not true! I'm not dead! Demons don't die! DEMONS DON'T DIE!"

Even as he hysterically screamed it to himself, Bill knew that somehow they had found a way. Some way, the Pines twins had discovered, stumbled upon his deepest, darkest secret.

"NO! DEMONS DON'T DIE! I CAN'T DIE! IT'S NOT POSSIBLE! I _AM _A DEMON! MY NAME IS BILL!"

Dipper and Mabel looked at each other, confused.

"Did you hear-"

"No, it couldn't be. it's just our imagination after talking about him."

They shook their heads, trying to clear them of the screaming that rang through them.

"It's not your imagination! I'm here! I'm not dead! I'm always watching! I can't do that if I'm dead!"

The twins stared down at the hat and tie respectively.

"What should we do with them?"

Dipper and Mabel shared an uneasy look. He was gone, but it didn't make throwing them in to the bottomless pit an attractive idea.

"Keep them I guess." Dipper finally replied.

A grin crossed Mabel's features for a moment.

"I know just the place!"

She whispered something in her brother's ear and, they both ran off laughing. Care free yet again just before the end of the summer, resuming life as if this had all just been a game to them.

_"It **had **been all a game, hadn't it?" _He reflected bitterly.

Once again, he had been thwarted by them. But with one lingering detail; This time, it was for good.


End file.
